“Father! ... Father!”

“My son ...  I was afraid ... you were lost ... gone ... into a far country....  It would have broken my heart!”

He said never a word; but hung his head upon his breast, and clung to my knees.  When he raised his eyes to mine, their look was so piteous that I had to put my hand upon him, as one reassures one’s child.  So for a healing time we two remained thus, both silent.  The garden was exquisitely still and calm and peaceful.  We were shut in and canopied by walls and roof of waving green, lighted with great cream-colored flowers with hearts of gold, and dappled with sun and shadow.  Through it came the vireo’s fairy flute.

God knows what thoughts went through John Flint’s mind; but for me, a great peace stole upon me, mixed with a greater, reverent awe and wonder.  Oh, heart of little faith!  I had been afraid; I had doubted and despaired and been unutterably wretched; I had thought him lost whom the Powers of Darkness swooped upon, conquered, and led astray.  And God had needed nothing stronger than a butterfly’s fragile wing to bear a living soul across the abyss!

We went together, after a while, to his rooms, and when he had submitted to Kerry’s welcome, we carefully examined the beautiful insect he had captured.  As he had said, she had not lost a scale; and she was by far the most astonishing aberrant I have ever seen, before or since.  The Turnus is perhaps the most beautiful of our butterflies, and this off-color was larger than the normal, and more irregularly and oddly and brilliantly colored.  Their natural coloring is gorgeous enough; but hers was like a seraph’s head-jewels.

I have her yet, with the date of her capture written under her.  She is the only one of all our butterflies I claim personally.  The gold has never been minted that could buy that Turnus.

“I had the station agent wire for my grip,” said Flint casually.  “And I gave the darky I knocked down fifty cents to soothe his feelings.  He offered to let me do it again for a quarter.”  His eyes roved over the pleasant workroom with its books and cabinets, its air of homely comfort; through the open door one glimpsed the smaller bedroom, the crucifix on the white wall.  He dropped his hand on Kerry’s head, close against his knee, and drew a sharp breath.

“Father,” said he, quietly, and looked at me with steady eyes, “you don’t need to be afraid for me any more as you had to be to-day.  To-day’s the last of my—­my dumfoolishness.”  After a moment he added: 

“Remember what that little girl said when she gave me her dog?  Well, I reckon she was right.  I reckon I’m here for keeps.  I reckon, father, that you and I do belong.”

“Yes,” said I; and looked over the cases of our butterflies, and the books we had gathered, and the table where we worked and studied together.  “Yes; you and I belong.”  And I left him with Kerry’s head on his knees, and Kerry’s eyes adoring him, and went over to the Parish House to tell Madame that John Flint had changed his mind and wouldn’t go North just now, because an aberrant Turnus had beguiled him.